Friday, 3 September 2010

Woopsie.

Ok, I forgot to post when I said I would. Again. But, to be fair, I've been pretty busy; school started again today, and I needed to organise everything.
I said I'd post my results, so here they are:
Maths: A*
Physics: A*
Chemistry: A*
Biology: A*
English language: A
History: A
Geography: A*
Spanish: A
German: A*
English literature: It's currently being re-marked.
FSMQ: (Equiv. to A-Level maths) A (highest mark)

So yeah, pretty happy with that (:

As I am lazy, I shall copy and paste how my first day back went from the School Thread on ACC:

Walked with Sadie to school and found out I'm in Mr. Jones' form. I wanted Frau Bower DDD:
Then had an assembly like, "It's wonderful to have you back. You're like homing pigeons, we let you free but you still came back.." etc. etc.

Then, went to form. Oh my God, Mr. Jones is the scariest man alive, I swear. Hannah came in talking, and he was just like, "OUT! OUT, NOW!"
Although, he's one of these people who you can't tell if they're joking or not, sooo..
He's also, like, ridiculously clever, and speaks fluent Latin (he used to give whole lessons in Latin, Christ knows if anyone actually understood him) O_e When he gave out the time-tables, he went to Milky, "Ah, McConnell, you're a clever one, aren't you? That makes two of us; you and I"
When he came around to me, he went, "Lara.. Lara, Lara, Lara... you're a clever cloggs too :D That's three!"

And then he gave a speech about how GCSEs are a doss compared to A-Levels, and how ridiculously hard we'll have to work. Inspiring ._.

There are a few new people in our year, one of whom I swear is about 20. I think he said he'd already done Sixth Form and had also worked for a year in Newcastle, so he's at least 19.

After form, we went to sign on for our subjects. Basically just meant we had to go to the Old Gym, where the HoDs were sitting at desks, and as long as you still wanted to do a subject, they put a tick next to your name and Bob's yer uncle.
At the science one, it really scared me. There was no queue, and three science teachers - Dr. Mulcahy, Dr. Millington, Dr. LeSurf - and they all went, "Ahh, Lara."
I was like O_e because none of them have taught me before..
Then Dr. Millington went, "Yes, yes, amazing results.." and Dr. Mulcahy chipped in, "Well done! Absolutely outstanding!" (apparently I got top in the year for all of the sciences.. according to them?) and beamed a semi-toothless smile at me.
I laughed nervously and walked off quickly.

Then, at the maths one, Merson was like "Ah, hellooooo :D" :L He then went, "If you wish to discuss Further Maths with me, meet me in my room in about half an hour."
I just went, "O.e sorry, could you please re-phrase that?" :L

But yeah. Went to discuss it with him, but took Andy along so I wasn't a loner. Sir kept on looking from me to Andy with a small smile.

I'm pretty pleased with my timetable, and I'll make another post about that soon. Maybe. If I feel like it :P

Monday, 23 August 2010

Feme Parks, innit?

Aloha (: I haven't updated this bloggity in a while, have I?
I would say it's because I have been so incredibly busy I just haven't had time but, well, that would be a lie. I just couldn't be arsed.
I also cannot remember what I have got up to since I last posted, so I shall just talk about yesterday.

Earlier this week, some friends and I went to Louisa's house. Among other things, we discussed what we could do to make things a bit interesting, considering we go back to school in under two weeks' time. Lou came up with the idea of going to a theme park, and to cut a long story short, six of us agreed that we'd go to Thorpe Park on the Sunday (yesterday).

So, yesterday morning, I found myself dragged out of bed at 4.50am to traipse up to the trainstation for a 7am train to London King's Cross.

To go off at a tangent a tad, but I love walking really early in the morning. I had to leave my house at 6.20, and the streets were just so peaceful, I loved it.

Anyway. From King's Cross, we got the tube to Vauxhall, then a train to Staines, and finally a bus to Thorpe Park, getting there at 9.45-ish.
Now, I am not a morning person in the slightest. I detest them. By the time we arrived at Thorpe Park, I was already a walking zombie, so I downed a few Red Bulls and got myself all caffeinated up.

Thorpe Park itself was ridiculously overpriced, but we beat the system by getting 2-for-1 entrance tickets.

Now, when I was younger, I hated theme parks. I was afraid to go on all of the rides, with the exception of the tea cups, and I generally had an awful time watching everyone had fun; so I made up for lost time and went on almost every ride in the park.

All of the adrenaline from the rides made me feel wide awake again - however, seeing my photo from the Stealth ride, I was brought back to earth as I realised I looked like a zombie which was about to drop dead for the second time.

As you may have guessed by my writing, I am not quite in the mood for blogging right now. Tomorrow is GCSE results day, and I am shit scared. So I'll end the blog here, and if I do well tomorrow, I'll post my results.

Cyaaa.

Friday, 13 August 2010

Sweet 16.

Ah, yes. As the title gives away, it was my 16th birthday recently - on Wednesday, the 11th August.
I am one of the youngest in my year, so as school progressed, I saw most of my friends have their 16th birthdays way before mine - one of my friends in my year turned 16 less than a month after I turned 15!
So, I awaited my birthday eagerly - and what a day it was.

I'd gone through many plans when deciding what to do for my birthday. Originally, I was going to get a load of people together for a camp-out, with a BBQ etc. Then, we realised that, actually, that is illegal and the police would be highly likely to find us, so we decided not to do that.

In the end, it was my dad who came up with the idea. My parents hired out a 17-seater mini-bus for the day, so my mum, dad & I plus 14 of my friends went to the coast for the day.
Once we got there, my parents scarpered and left us to our own devices.

I had an absolute whale of a time (I love that expression, aha). We took loads of frisbees, a cricket set, a few footballs etc. to play with on the beach, and we all also took our swimming stuff. I don't usually like the sea, but I got thrown in there by my boyfriend and actually loved it, despite the fact it was freezing cold - I do live in England, after all.

After many eventful games of cricket, extreme frisbee and football, we headed off to the arcade machines. My friend Jordan was desperate to get a toy Buzz Lightyear from the grabby machine thing, and spent ages whittling his money away in vain :L He had to stop in the end because the 'bouncer' - a weedy, scruffy-looking man with a thick Yorkshire accent - was convinced he'd seen him "thumping the machine".
We were all like "Er, whaaaat? O_e"

So we took the piss out of the bouncer bloke for a while, and went back to the beach.

By the time we'd eaten at Pizza Hut and gone back to the beach, it was getting late-ish, so the beach was getting empty. Some people wandered off to go to the place with the larger rides, but I decided not too, as I felt a bit ill.

As it got darker and my friends all came back, we did the cake and let off a few Chinese lanterns. The cake was delish, although I accidentally dropped it in the sand, so half of it went to waste :L
The Chinese lantern bit was amazing, although we set off an alarm because the coast guard somehow thought it was a distress signal, and came to save us..

The night ended in a literal bang, as there were fireworks on the pier at 10pm, which, if I do say so myself, was a rather nice way to end the evening.

Well, I say end the evening, but it wasn't quite - we all piled back into the mini-van, and my dad took us all home to mine for a 'sleepover' - but, of course, none of us slept.
All in all, it was the best birthday in a long time. I spent it with my amazing friends & boyfriend, and had the best day.

What did make me laugh as I looked back at the photos taken of the day is that my friend Sadie seems to have been spying on Andy and I. I've seen a few photos taken from a distance which I had no idea were taken :L

Although I do have one which I like - this one:



I love him :')

Tuesday, 10 August 2010

'Fun' in the Sun.

Look at the irony in the title. Ahahaha.
-.-
As you may have already guessed from my last post, this wasn't the best of holidays. I much prefer short - say, three day - breaks to overly long breaks. That way, I can go there, do what I want, and then go home.
To be fair, I probably had already decided that I wasn't going to enjoy myself before we even set off. But bear with me.

On the Saturday, we left Stansted airport and flew to Perpignan, in the south of France. The flight itself was pretty uneventful, although when we experience turbulence near landing, my mum almost crushed all of the bones in my hand - she's absolutely petrified of landings, let alone when flying with Ryanair.

As our flight had been delayed by an hour and a half, we arrived in France later than we'd anticipated. This wouldn't have been an issue, had the villa people (we rented out a villa for two weeks) had left us anything in the fridge.
As it was, they'd only left us a pot of half-eaten jam.
This also wouldn't have been a problem.. that is, if the French shops didn't all shut at 8pm.
What sort of country does that?! D:
As we were staying near a town called Ceret, we decided to go out for a meal - but everywhere was full.
I'd not eaten since breakfast, so I feel I was allowed to be a bitchy so-and-so at that moment in time.

Not a good start to the holiday. We ended up getting a takeaway pizza at 11pm.

I can't actually remember exactly what we did over the two weeks, but it did involve a lot of beaches. I got horribly burnt on the first day of the holiday, and spend the rest of the holiday suffering with a second degree burn on my left shoulder.
So, whenever we went to a beach, I spent it sulking under a sun umbrella thing, reading a book. As a result of that, plus the fact that I read abormally quickly, I got through 16 books on that holiday, each with between 300 and 700 pages.

Of course, there were good points to the holiday. There was an adorable waiter in one of the restaurants...
"Ah, 'allo. Are you from England? I recognise your accents, I lived in England for a while."
"Evening. Yeah, we're from Cambridge, do you know it?"
"Ah, Cambridge! Yes, close to Birmingham, where I lived. Le vurst city en England, oui?"

Bless him. Anyone with any geographical knowledge of England know that Cambridge and Birmingham aren't particularly close :P But he was so cute.

There were also a fair few amusing moments. For example, my dad is absolutely appalling at languages. We went into a pharmacy to get something to treat my sunburn, and my dad went, "What is sunburn in French? Salle de bain?"
Anyone with even a tiny grasp of French knows that 'salle de bain' is bathroom, not sunburn :L
After that, we tried to keep him quiet, but we still has a few mishaps - like when he asked for 'the banknote' instead of 'the bill' in a restaurant.

I think the part of the holiday I most enjoyed were the trips to Spain. It's funny, really - as soon as we crossed over the border and into Spain, it was as if we'd arrived home; we just felt so much more comfortable in Spain than in France.
Upon my request, we paid a visit to Barcelona. I'd been to Barcelona before, but that was over two years ago, and we weren't that far from it.
We actually visited it twice over our holiday. The first time, we all bundled into the car and went. We got miserably lost, and only really saw the Sagrada Familia (the huge Roman Catholic church in Barcelona, which is still being built).
On the second visit, however, just my dad and I went. I was the map reader, and if I do say so myself, I was a lot better at it than my mum was on our previous visit.

Our first stop was the Nou Camp, FC Barcelona's football stadium. We went on a tour of it, and then went into the enormous shop. My dad bought me a Messi shirt (: Only at the till did we realise that is cost €93.. ah, well, I love Lionel Messi.
We then went to La Rambla, a street full of street performers and all sorts. We also looked in all of the designer shops, and looked around the Boqueria market, which is pretty amazing.

As this has become an absolute essay of a post, I apologise. I am very glad to be home now; we picked up our puppy on Sunday, I spent another amazing day with Andy yesterday, and it's my 16th birthday tomorrow. Things can't get much better.

Back from Holiday!

I am finally back from holiday. At long last.
Don't get me wrong. I like holidays. However, I do not like France. Where did we go? France.
I also don't like beaches, the sea, weather which is too hot, or waterparks. As my siblings are aged 12 and 8, they both love beaches, the sea and waterparks, so guess what we spent the majority of the holiday doing..

Before departing for holiday, I was already apprehensive. Two weeks away from my friends and boyfriend is pretty unbearable for me, especially when I have to spend that two weeks in a country I detest, doing activities I hate, with my family.

Perhaps for this reason, I packed the week before going away with seeing friends etc. For example, on the Monday, my friend James and I rode our bikes to a disused quarry, where we hope to do a photoshoot. On Tuesday, I played badminton with Kirstie and Sadie, and on Wednesday, I went with a load of friends to see Toy Story 3 (amazing film).
Thursday, I spent packing my suitcase and went to football training, whilst on Friday I met up with Andy. I had an amazing day, as I usually do when I'm with him. Bless his little cooking skills, he almost set the kitchen on fire. And his mum had put her car keys in the oven, for whatever reason.

Now, I know it sounds sad, but I really, really missed him when I was away. We usually text each other each evening, from about 7pm to 2am in the morning, and when we meet up, we spend the whole day together. So I found it really difficult to go without contact for two weeks :L
I'm such a sad act.

To avoid this from becoming too much of an essay, I shall post what I got up to on holiday, in the next blog post. See you in five minutes..

Sunday, 18 July 2010

Broken Promises.

I'm a failure ;~;

You know that promise I made to myself; the going running one?
I've broken it already. Instead of getting up early to go for a run, I instead had a lie-in. Rather more enjoyable, although not exactly physically exerting.

Ah, well.

That was on Saturday morning. Also on Saturday morning, my whole family bundled into the car, and we went to visit our puppy again.
We cannot pick our puppy up yet, as we are going on holiday. So, the breeders agreed that we could pay him a little visit so we don't go into withdrawal..

I took my perv camera along, and I took a few photos. I apologise if this doesn't work, but I shall show you my particular favourite:



Assuming that has worked, isn't he adorable? He's eight weeks old at the moment, and we've named him Chester.
Can't wait to pick him up <3

After we got home from seeing Chester, I got ready to go out. My friend, Jess, had invited me to a party, and I'm never one to refuse a good ol' shin-dig.
She had advertised this thing as a "Garden party! With BBQ, drinking games and loads of fun!"
Perhaps understandably, I thought it was going to be a good'un.

Wrong.

I arrived, and everyone was sitting in her dining room, in a circle. It was almost silent, a few people were texting, but that was it.
To be fair, it did perk up after 9pm, but only because that was when she got the alcohol out. Before then, I'd endured 3 hours of utter boredom.
Now, I don't need alcohol to have a good time, but the other people at this party were the introverted, quiet type. I'm the opposite. I could tell that I scared a few of them.
At around 10, people started leaving. I stayed, and it got better then; the quiets were the people who left first, so by the time they'd all left, I was just with people I could get along with without scaring.
We played some Mario Kart Wii. My driving was atrocious, but I'm blaming the fact that:
1) I'd never played it before.
2) I was steering with one hand.
3) I'd had a bit too much JD and coke. Or whatever was in that concoction I was given.
I headed off at around 11.30. If I hadn't, I'd have been the only person left..

Today has been good, too. My mum, dad and I went to a retail park to pick up a dog cage (sounds cruel, it's just to house-train the puppy) and some dog toys, but I ended up getting some new football boots, a load of vest-tops and a David and Goliath t-shirt.
Not a bad haul considering I have no money.. xD
Tonight, we're off out to a restaurant, which should be nice. My brother and sister are with my grandparents at Alton Towers, so it's just my parents and I.

Peace and quiet. Lovely.

Thursday, 15 July 2010

Thank goodness.

Football training is cancelled tonight.
Thank. God.
Don't get me wrong, I love football (soccer, not American). It's just that I am so unbelievably unfit right now; I practically live off crisps and Red Bull, and have done no physical exercise whatsoever since May.
Not to mention, the weather has been bloody awful.

It always happens here - we go through a period of hot and sunny weather. Just as we're getting used to it, the thunderstorms come. I did learn about this in geography, but I've forgotten why. I've been well taught.
So, yesterday brought with it the first of them. I had friends over and we were having a film day. Suddenly, out of nowhere, we saw some lightning and heard thunder, and the storm was upon us.
My cat, bless her, was hidden underneath the desk in the study. She doesn't like loud noises.

My friends all had to leave in the middle of the thunderstorm, so my mum gave them lifts. It would've taken a cruel person to allow them to walk home in that :L

Soon after they left, the rain basically stopped. Typical.
I was glad of it, though - as it was Wednesday, I had my St. John Ambulance meeting. James came to knock for me, and on the way walking to ol' John, we went to One Stop and bought some Monster.
Yummy <3

We then fancied a stroll in the wooded area, but both got petrified after we saw someone else, so we ran for it xD
We then arrived at St. John rather flustered, and got odd looks off the other people there; we couldn't say we'd been running because we were running late, because we were 10 minutes early.

The meeting passed without much excitement. We learnt how to fill out PRFs (Patient Report Forms - they have to be filled out each time you treat someone, even if it's just putting a plaster on). We then did scenarios, and I had to pretend to treat a 53-year-old diabetic who had a burst varicose vein.
Considering I've done no first aid training (yet), I don't think I did too badly. :B

Today, nothing exciting has happened, except for the second wave of the storm, and the cancellation of football training.
I think I may take up running to get fitter. I'll start on Saturday, and I'll go out at 5.30am-ish, so it'll be light, but no-one will be about to see me.

Watch this space.

Tuesday, 13 July 2010

Whoopsie.

So much for my 'let's post every day!' promise.. ;P
I have been meaning to post, actually, but I have been quite pre-occupied, for reasons I shall detail in this post.
Well, on Monday and Tuesday of last week, I didn't get up to much at all; I just lazed around. I think, I can't actually quite remember.
Wednesday perked up a bit, with my first St. John Ambulance meeting. For those of you who haven't a clue what St. John Ambulance is, it's a volunteer organisation which trains people to administer first aid.
I popped along to the meeting with my friend, James, and we were thrown in at the deep end in our first ever session - CPR.
A man there, who is a nurse by profession, first gave us a presentation on the heart. My GCSE biology came in handy as I could already read an ECG, could tell you where the SAN and AVN are, can rattle off a list of heart conditions etc. which seemed to impress the bloke.
We then got on to the practical side. We got shown how to check airways, open airways, do chest compressions, mouth-to-mouth resuscitation etc.
I was pleased with myself; the chest compressions, you're supposed to aim for doing 30 of them in 18 seconds. I got it spot-on 18 seconds, but James went too fast and did 30 in 12 seconds. He was told that if he did that, he could very well kill the casualty.. :L

Skipping forwards now on to Thursday; although I left school two months ago, due to exams, the rest of the school - Year 7, 8, 9 and 10 - were doing their Sports Day. Last year, I was trained as a Sports Leader, and was asked to go in to help with the running of Sports Day.
Now, given that they had asked specifically for trained Sports Leaders, I had assumed that I would be needed for important jobs - surely anyone could do it otherwise?
Wrong.
Sadie and I spent the whole day measuring how far small children could throw the discus and shotput, almost getting decapitated around 10 times in the process.
Still, I suppose at least I got a tan..

Friday passed without much going on, except babysitting. The child that I babysit is unbelievably cute, and I get £10/hour for looking after her, so I thoroughly enjoy the job. We watched Spongebob for a while, and then I put her to bed. I only actually looked after her for about an hour, because as soon as she's in bed, she goes to sleep.

Saturday is when I actually got out of the house to see friends again. I live relatively near a reservoir, which is good for riding your bike around. As the weather was forecasted to be nice, Louisa, Nicole and I decided we'd ride there, ride around and then ride back.
What. A. Mistake.
Firstly, the route we took - the only route not on a major road like the A1 - was ridiculously difficult. It was seven miles to the reservoir, and although that doesn't sound like much, we had to travel across the countryside - that means, uneven ground, hills, no civilisation for miles around.
Secondly, we mis-judged the weather. Yes, it was nice.. if you are the sort of person who enjoys 32-degree heat. Being English and thoroughly unused to this sort of weather, we suffered.
Thirdly, we ran out of water two miles into the journey.
Fourthly, we got lost.
Fifthly (if that's a word), none of us are into regular exercise at the moment, and suffered greatly.
Lastly, sitting on a saddle for hours on end, hurts.
Still, though, we completed the 22 miles (7 there, 8 around, 7 back), even if not graciously.

When I arrived back at home, I was greeted by my parents who had been to Milton Keynes earlier that day. They'd bought me my birthday present - an iPhone 4 - early, and I spent the rest of the night ecstatic.

Sunday, Andy (my boyfriend) came over. We played a bit of pool, listened to some music etc.
Then the children came over.
I have a little sister. She's friends with a girl called Heather. I babysit Heather's sister, Rebecca.
Heather (8 years old) and Rebecca (4) came over to my house. Instead of doing what they usually do - joining my sister in watching a film - they seemed to take a shine to Andy. By means of showing how much they liked him, they decided to 'playfully attack' him. This means, they whacked him with snooker cues, threw unripe apples at him and sprayed him with the garden hose until he was drenched.
Bless him, he put up with it all whilst I tried in vain to make them stop.

Still, though, I now have some rather hilarious videos on my new phone to show people..

Tuesday, 6 July 2010

Another Good Day.

My summer is, so far, turning out a lot better than I had originally expected; I'd envisioned spending days on end, cooped up inside my house, bored out of my mind whilst everyone else is having fun.
Thus far, it has been most enjoyable.

Yesterday, I met up with my boyfriend, and we went to the cinema to see 'Get Him to The Greek' - the film with Russell Brand in it. I cried of laughter when that American bloke imitated Brand's accent, and my boyfriend whispered in my ear, "You sound more like Russell Brand than I'd realised.."
This got me worried - I don't particularly want to sound like a man - until I realised he meant the accent.
I think I need elocution lessons.

I cannot actually remember that much of the film, but I did fall in love with the bit about the Jeffrey - the spliff with a thousand different kind of drugs in it - and the furry wall.
"When life slips you a Jeffrey, stroke the furry wall.. (8)"

The journey back from the cinema took a lot longer than it should have - 25 minutes on the train should have been the entire journey. However, there were delays, so the first train going home was at 9.47; we had come out of the cinema just before 9. I was extremely tempted to just hop on the train to Newcastle, for whatever reason, but I decided against it.
Still, we waited - we had no alternative - as it gradually got colder; although, being the female, I was lucky, as I could steal his coat (:<
I also hid behind him as a train driver who looked scarily like Stalin stared at me as a train pulled into the station.

When the train finally came, we had an uneventful train journey back, which made me wonder what delays there were. Apparently, there were maintenance works going on, but if that was the case, we must have just run over the maintenance workers.

Once we got back, it was just gone 10, and we still had the walk from the train station to my house (he, being the gentleman he is, walked me all the way home). He was starving, so we went to get food from the Garage. On the way to aforementioned Garage, we acquired a cat. I'm not quite sure whose cat it was, but it certainly took a shine to us, and followed us all the way to the Garage; it even came in with us!
The person working on the till was like, "Erm, excuse me, but could you please remove your cat?"
We loved this cat's loyalty, and christened him 'Bernard', even though we weren't entirely sure of the gender. But he was cute, fluffy and ginger, and just looked like a Bernard.

Also in the Garage, I got drawn to a rather magnificent children's magazine. Not for the content - I'm far too mature for that - but because it came with a free 'barnyard play set'.
Oh yes.
Hello, Daisy the cow, Rufus the dog and Hilda the pig.

Unfortunately, Bernard didn't follow me all the way home - although part of me is glad, for my own cat would never speak to me again had she found out I'd been seeing another cat - and the journey back from the Garage to my house was pretty uneventful, and I got home at around 11.30, even though it should really have taken only 20 minutes to walk back from the train station.

As for today, I've done nothing except for convince my parents to buy me an iPhone 4 for my birthday <3>
I've also teased my brother about his 'illness' - apparently, he's far too 'weak' to go to school, yet can prance around the front room playing tennis on Wii Fit.
Hm. He must be feeling awful.

Sunday, 4 July 2010

Better Than Expected.

I apologise in advance if this blog is riddled with spelling mistakes and grammatical errors, for I am concentrating on two things at once - writing this, and clenching my stomach, for I am in rather a lot of pain.
Why the pain?
I have a feeling it is down to my 'summer diet'. No, not a diet plan - but when I'm on my summer holidays, my diet seems to consist of three things:
- Crisps. Mainly Doritos.
- Energy drinks.
- Alcohol.

I fear that, after seven weeks of this diet, my body is beginning to reject it.

Ah, well.

Anyway. My weekend was better than expected. I had banked on spending Saturday lazily cooped up inside, but my best friend rang to say that her parents were away for the weekend; did I want to go over?
Of course, I did, so I packed my things and went to hers. We didn't do anything particularly exciting - mainly sunbathing and watching films - but it was better than nothing.
We also cracked open the cider, although I fear I may have drunk mine too quickly - when we went to One Stop to buy Doritos, I was feeling rather light-headed, and I almost skipped in front of a car.
We then watched some rubbish 2am telly and listened to some music.
I eventually got to sleep, but not for long - it was far too hot - and when I woke up, at around 5am, there was the most absurd advert on; one for spray-on hair.
It looked quite exciting. I'm quite tempted to buy a can, so I can give myself a beard.
Won't my boyfriend be chuffed?

I got picked up from her house later on in the morning, and got ready to go out again,for I was meeting Lou, James, Nicole and Sadie at Subway. I didn't buy anything, but at least I was out of the house.
We then toddled to my house to pick up some Smirnoff Ices, and my paedophile camera. James took a shine to it, and when we all toddled to the park, he was obsessed with taking photos of us jumping off the benches.
There's an amazing one which I took of James landing after jumping off this bench :L
However, although it was nice out, and fairly sunny, it also got chilly pretty quickly, as it was rather windy; that's when I came home.

When I got home, I found out that my parents had been to the pet shop, to buy things for our puppy. We haven't got him yet, but because we're picking him up the day after our holiday, we need to buy everything before we go away.
Our puppy is a boxer, and we've named him 'Chester'. We used to have a boxer dog named Dottie, but she unfortunately died suddenly last October. Now, though, it seems the right time to get another.

Going off on a bit of a tangent, my friend's cousin's also getting a boxer dog, and they want to give it a 'stereotypically German name', and they asked me if I could think of any.
Now, I know it's bad, but when someone says to me, "Think of a German name!" my first thoughts go something like:
"ADOLF! No, no, sorry.. Rommel? Not that either? Why not? OK then, how about Roehm? Goebbels?"
I decided not to put my suggestions forward.
In the end, I think they've decided on 'Boris'. Is that a German name? I don't know... what I do find funny is, they're getting another dog, a terrier-type, and calling it either Dave or John.
If it's Dave, it'll be like Boris and Dave (Tory party anyone?).
If it's John, it'll be Boris Johnson.
Not to mention that both Dave and John are hilarious names for dogs.

I laughed more than I should have.

Friday, 2 July 2010

Helpful Citizen..

Despite being on my summer holidays, I went into school for a few hours this morning to be 'trained' - for, next year, I shall be helping Year 7s with their maths. Apparently, they'll all have got a Level 2 or Level 3 at the end of Year 6. To people who aren't British, this shall mean nothing, but this should give you a good idea - Year 7s are 11 or 12. I got a Level 3 in maths when I was in Year 2, aged 6.
The most difficult thing therefore shall be simplifying the maths enough for them to be able to understand it. Many have difficulty with '3 + 8', simply because the answer is a number greater than 10; more often than not, they have to use numberlines for most of their calculations.
Even so, I'll persevere with them. I don't particularly like 11 and 12 year olds, but I am more than willing to try and help them improve their maths. After all, maths is an important key subject, and one which happens to be one of my strongest points.
Not to mention it can go on my UCAS when university application comes around..

That's about all for today. I'll probably have a lazy day tomorrow, but I should be going out on Sunday, so I'll hopefully have something fairly interesting to write about then.

Thursday, 1 July 2010

Heyy, blog.

After apparently creating this blog all the way back in April - what a successful enterprise - I have only just re-discovered it; I think about now is the right time to begin the blog for real, as I have ahead of me a ridiculously long summer, so I shall have a lot of free time on my hands.
I would usually begin something like this by telling you a bit about myself - however, I am going to assume that you ended up at this blog by following a link from ACC, in which case you can look at my profile on there and save me the typing, si si senor?

Another reason why I'm starting this today is because I actually have something to talk about, for last night was my prom. It's a mainly American thing, I think, but the trend's gradually come over here, and we celebrated the end of Year 11 in style last night.

I was apprehensive over this whole prom thing. As far as I was concerned, I'd already left school - my exams were over, we'd had our 'Leavers' Day'; why did we need anything else? However, I soon realised that the prom served as a kind of 'goodbye' to those who are leaving next year, as well as a pretty stylish celebration of all of the work we've put into our studies over the years.

My friends and I had booked to turn up in a 'Green Goddess' - a fire-engine type vehicle whose insides had been converted into a limousine. I was also apprehensive about this, as from the photos it looked fairly ugly, but I found out when we arrived at the prom that literally every other group had arrived in a limousine, so I was grateful that we had arrived in something a bit different - even if I did almost trip over when I got out of it.

I don't want this post to be overly long, so I shall break the prom's events down into a few bulletpoints:

- Arrived at prom. Found my boyfriend (Andy), headed into the prom with him.
- Sat around drinking our free drinks (Y).
- Had my photo taken with Andy.
- Headed back into the dance place, boogeyed a bit.
- Feet started hurting due to my heels, so went to sit outside.
- A few prizes - driving lessons, a digital camera, hot air balloon ride - were given out by means of a raffle. I won nothing.
- Prom King and Queen crowned. The 'Queen' was evidently a joke, 'ironic' vote - bless her - whereas the 'King' was voted for because he's popular.
- Headed back onto the dancefloor. Somehow managed to do the macarena and the Cha-Cha Slide.
- The balloon drop.
- The last few songs, danced with Andy. 'Sweet Child O' Mine' by Guns 'N' Roses, 'Mr. Brightside' by The Killers, and 'Angels' by Robbie Williams.
- Cue the holding back tears moment.

So yes, I shall bore you with no more, and I shall leave you with, "I had a great, memorable night last night - and expect regular, sometimes rambling posts from now on!"